


"You Can Borrow Mine"

by impulse_baker



Series: 100 Ways to Say 'I Love You' [20]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Boys In Love, Castiel and Dean Winchester Need to Use Their Words, Dean Talks About Feelings, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Idiots in Love, M/M, kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-12
Updated: 2018-03-12
Packaged: 2019-03-30 09:35:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13948803
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/impulse_baker/pseuds/impulse_baker
Summary: Dean is tired of Castiel's self sacrificing ways but it makes him think...has he not made it clear enough to Cas what losing his angel does to him every single time?





	"You Can Borrow Mine"

Life for Team Free Will was never dull for very long. Someone was always trying to take over the world, or going on a murderous rampage, or threatening an apocalypse. There was always some monster a few states away terrorizing the innocent, and the not-so-innocent. Someone or some _thing_ was always out for blood or brains or hearts, or on the really exciting day, _souls._

Life had no shortage of danger for them, but every threat was faced with the same dedication to saving people, hunting things, the family business.

There were times, however, when Dean wished they could slow down. He watched Charlie show Cas how to fold an origami Millennium Falcon and he thought of that silly myth about how if you fold a thousand paper cranes, you get a wish granted. He knew what he would wish for.

Now that the Bunker had a lot more frequent residents, Dean found how much enjoyment could come from large extensions of leisure time. Gabriel stayed with them full time now, both Eileen and Charlie came and went often, and Jody and the girls were encouraged to visit whenever they wanted.

Dean would have made some kind of comment to his brother about how much time he spent alone with Gabriel and Eileen in some corner of the Bunker, but he was too busy in his own corner with Castiel.

Sometimes, during quiet moments together of not doing anything in particular, just sitting in easy companionship, Dean would think about how fragile this all could be. How long until the next big bad came along and snatched up this world of happiness that was growing around their family? Peace never lasted long. Who would he lose next? How far away was the next time he would have to hold Castiel’s unresponsive body in his arms? How long until Sam was shot down?

Sure, maybe clouding the good moments with negative thoughts wasn’t the best idea. He knew he needed to stay positive, self-fulfilling prophecy and all that social psych stuff Cas told him about when they came across a poorly written book in an antique store. But could he really be blamed? In his experience, good things didn’t last long.

 

 

Dean and Castiel were currently cornered in a warehouse by a group of overzealous angels who had caught wind of Gabriel’s return and somehow found out he was with the Winchesters. Sam stayed behind with the still healing archangel, and with Jack, who Cas and Dean forbade from joining them. Dean chose to pointedly ignore the way the Nephilim grumbled _yes, dad_ resentfully under his breath at him. If he considered Cas his father and Dean his dad, what kind of relationship did they have in the kid’s eyes?

A crash made Dean throw an arm over Cas to shield him with his upper body and make him duck.

“Son of a bitch. What do we do? I lost my angel blade back there and we’re kind of running out of options.”

“I will draw them out. I need you to create this sigil,” he traced some curves and lines deftly in the dust. “I will do the rest.”

“No! No fucking way you’re getting all of their attention on you at once. I can’t even help you fight any off, I lost my blade!”

“You can borrow mine.” His blue eyes were filled with a meaningful look and it scared Dean. It scared him, but he understood.

He and Cas worked as a unit, especially when they fought side by side. There had to be trust there for it to work, and right now, he had to trust his angel, no matter how much the determination in his eyes filled him with fear.

“Ok. Do you have another one?”

“You need to trust me. Now start drawing.”

He wasn’t familiar with this sigil, but he acted quickly, replicating exactly what his angel drew. He looked up in time to see his entire world, unarmed, surrounded by angry angels.

_Unarmed._

_Surrounded._

“Cas!” The desperation and renewed fear in his voice ripped through the room and suddenly all eyes were on him.

It all happened too quickly. Castiel said a few words in Enochian, one of the angels jabbed forward and slashed shallowly across the front of the trench coat, and somehow, Dean understood to mimic him when Cas slammed his palm against the wall nearest him.

There was a flash of light and Dean almost blinded himself trying to keep his eyes open through it to make sure Cas never left his sight.

He wasn’t sure if the tears in his eyes were from Cas’ fallen body or from the intense brightness.

He scrambled forwards and lunged at his angel.

“What the fuck was that? Are you ok?” He afforded himself the luxury of running his hands all over Cas, his face, his arms, his chest, finding a resting place on the back of his neck.

He didn’t get an answer for a few moments. Cas’ only response was to slouch forward against Dean and hold onto the hem of his flannel shirt.

“Can we go home?” His voice was soft, but Dean was thankful to hear it.

“Yeah. Yeah, let’s go, Superman.”

 

The car ride back was quiet. Castiel was asleep, and instead of leaning his head against the window, he was inclined more towards the driver side. Dean didn’t move him.

There were a lot of things he wanted to say. There were things he needed to ask. His head was a torrent of anger and fear and annoyance but above all, relief _._ He could wait until Cas rested up a bit before he tore into him about the stunt he just pulled. How could the dumbass give him his only angel blade when he was about to throw himself into a pit of fucking _angels_?

 

Cas slept the whole way and even when they arrived at the Bunker, he insisted on watching a movie with Dean, which meant he would be sleeping on the couch next to the hunter with Taraji P. Henson kicking ass in the background.

Dean tried to calm down and just focus on the movie. He tried to expel thoughts of losing Cas from his mind. He tried telling himself that Cas was here, safe, breathing evenly and deeply next to him, and that was what mattered. He tried to appreciate that things had ultimately gone well and that they were all safe and the angels hadn’t gotten any closer to getting to Gabriel.

But images of a bloodied button up shirt, of scorched wings in the dirt, of shadows of tattered wings, of cracking black skin tore at his sanity.

He moved to get up and find some whiskey and maybe find the bright side of the whole situation at the bottom of the bottle.

But when he moved, it jostled Castiel so that he shifted to lay his head in Dean’s lap and nuzzle the outside of his knee.

“Don’t go.” His whisper was like granules of honeycomb, rough and dark but sweet.

“You can’t keep doing this, man.”

“Doing what?”

“Almost getting yourself killed.”

“I knew what I was doing.”

“Apparently you forgot that the only thing you can use to fight off angels with angel blades is an angel blade. Oh and maybe you forgot that _you’re a fucking angel._ ” His response was a lot more gruff than he intended, but he had enough of keeping his thoughts and fears from Cas. Maybe that’s what it would take. Maybe if his angel just _knew_ , he would stop putting himself in danger. But how the fuck could he not know?

“Making sure you were protected was much more important to me at that moment.”

“Don’t go there, Cas.”

“I had a plan. All went well. Nothing – ”

“How could you risk this good thing we have going?”

There. He said it. It was out in the open.

Castiel was sitting up now, sitting so close, his legs were half on top of Dean’s.

“Dean… I... I don’t want to ruin anything. I just want to make sure everyone I love is safe.”

_I love you, too._

“You have to stop putting yourself in danger. We’re a team. We keep each other safe, but not by almost getting ourselves killed.”

“I’m sorry.”

The look his angel gave him could only be described as puppy dog eyes, and it coaxed out an exhausted laugh from Dean.

“Let’s just… let’s just not. Ok?”

“Yes, Dean.”

Turns out watching _Proud Mary_ was a lot more enjoyable for Dean when he had his angel safely in his arms and awake enough to ask enough questions about the plot to drive him crazy.

He’d take it. He would take this over anything.

**Author's Note:**

> The format was kind of different on this one. I usually build up to the "I love you" semtence but this time I kind of made EVERYTHING an "I love you" statement between them. Hope you enjoyed this (and that it was worth the wait...sorry about that)  
> And uhh how do you guys feel about a little background Sam/Eileen/Gabriel? I'm kind of in love with the idea of them in love...  
> Let me know what you think!
> 
> Previous work: "Can I Hold Your Hand?"  
> Next work: "You Might Like This."


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